3-082-879 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

The Empire of India Exhibition, at Earl's Court, Kensington, [London], 1895. 'At a time when our attention is being directed to the Indian empire with more than usual emphasis, the Exhibition which was opened on May 27..has a special appropriateness. Under the transforming genius of the director-general, Mr. Imre Kiralfy, the fine grounds have become a "living picture" of India. There are relics of the Honourable East India Company to remind us of days which are fled, and an Indian city to show us the present life of the natives whom we hail as fellow-subjects of the Queen. Mr. Rowland Ward's jungle and a Burmese theatre are certain to attract crowds of spectators. There will be plenty of music to enliven the Exhibition every day, for the bands of the Grenadier and Coldstream Guards are engaged, as well as Venanzi's famous orchestra. Then, for those whose ambition flies high, there is the great wheel, capable of carrying 1200 people three hundred feet in the air...it will be no rash prophecy to say that the Empire of India Exhibition will be a success. It ought to have an educational as well as a recreative result, by impressing everyone with the great size and increasing importance of that little-known but major part of her Majesty's empire'. From "Illustrated London News", 1895.